


A Heart That is Always Yours

by Liza_Taylor



Series: Promptober 2020-Sylbern/Sylvadetta Edition [13]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Succubi & Incubi, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Asexual Bernadetta von Varley, Character Death, F/M, Forbidden Love, Incubus Sylvain Jose Gautier, Interspecies Romance, Love Confessions, October Prompt Challenge, Succubus Dorothea Arnault, Tragic Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-13
Updated: 2020-10-13
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:00:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26989393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liza_Taylor/pseuds/Liza_Taylor
Summary: As an incubus Sylvain views humans as a way to get fed. Bernie was different though, as she is asexual, Sylvain's powers do not work on her and as a result a friendship forms. A friendship, for Sylvain, shifts to something more.However, creatures of the night that live off of pleasure are never supposed to fall in love with humans...Prompt: Inhuman
Relationships: Dorothea Arnault & Sylvain Jose Gautier, Sylvain Jose Gautier & Bernadetta von Varley, Sylvain Jose Gautier/Bernadetta von Varley
Series: Promptober 2020-Sylbern/Sylvadetta Edition [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1947940
Comments: 4
Kudos: 18





	A Heart That is Always Yours

**Author's Note:**

> This one got away from me a bit, haha. I just kept wanting to write more and more and well, it ended up way longer than I thought it was going to be! Also wanted to go with a "tragic-love" feel for this one.

Sylvain got up from the bed, his hunger sated for now.

His latest meal, a woman with dark hair and ample breasts lay fast asleep, naked in the bed. With the energy drained out of her, she probably wouldn’t wake until the morning, their time together only a vague but pleasant dream.

With his stronger than human eyesight, he located his clothes scattered about the floor. Normally he wouldn’t care much about it, as an incubus he had the ability to call up a glamour to hide and change his appearance to what he wished it to be. However where he was going after this, he wanted to appear somewhat presentable and it would just makes things awkward if he showed up naked even if _she_ could not see that.

After throwing on his pants, his slung his shirt over an arm and made his way out of the small apartment. As soon as he opened the door, the noise of the bar next door assaulted his senses and he could already see a few possible choices for another meal walking away from the bar, their steps shaky from drink.

He shut the door behind him, casting out a bit of magic to lock it from the other side. He might be an incubus but he did have his manners.

After a quick roll of his shoulders, he let his wings unfurl from his back. Leathery like bat wings, the color similar to his dark red hair.

“You’re going to see her again, aren’t you?”

Sylvain glanced back and saw Dorothea leaning on the stairwell. Her green eyes were bright, obviously she had also taken advantage of this bar for a meal of her own tonight. Based on her tight-fit clothing that pushed up her breasts, she was obviously aiming to snag another meal before the night was over.

Dorothea sighed. “You really shouldn’t keep seeing her, this will never end well.”

“There’s no harm in it,” scoffed Sylvain. “Besides, there are plenty of stories of non-human creatures befriending humans. Why is this any different?”

“Because of what we are Sylvian-don’t turn your back on me,” she snapped.

Sylvain ignored the rest of her blabbering as he took off into the night with a flap of his wings, a glamour rendering him invisible to any human that looked up. He weaved through the tall city buildings as he made his way through the city, annoyance driving through his wings with each flap from Dorothea’s comments. What was there to worry about? _She_ was safe from his incubus abilities, why was Dorothea making a big deal out of nothing?

His mood lightened as he saw his destination ahead of him. A balcony of a fifth-story apartment complex. Unlike the ones around it, plants of different shapes and sizes filled the space except for a small path in the middle for one to walk. Or in Sylvain’s case, one to land on. He landed on the railing and carefully stepped down onto the balcony itself, careful to not knock over any of the plants. After pulling his wings back into his body, he put on the shirt he had carried over his arm on the trip over.

A quick test of the balcony door and he saw it was unlocked. He sighed and pulled it open and pushed the curtain aside and met with a cute, modern and tidy living room. The warmth smell of roasting meats and spices filled his nose as he shut the door behind him to not let the heat out and headed for the kitchen. “Bernie, you really should lock your balcony, burglars can get in that way you know.”

Bernie was in the middle of cooking dinner, pots and pans of all shapes and sizes taking up her stove. It was obviously a casual night for her as she was in a tank top and sweatpants. She looked at him with a smile that made his heart thump oddly for a moment. “Well I knew you were coming and it would be easier for you to get in.”

Well, that was true. Sylvain walked over and peered at the various pots on the stove. “Anything I can do to help?”

She pointed to one of the pots in the back. “You can stir and keep an eye on it so it doesn’t burn.”

“Leave it to me!” Sylvain half-paid attention to the pot, his focus on watching Bernie cook. She was the type of person that spent the weekends making large helpings of food so she could eat it during the week and not have to worry about cooking.

Their relationship was an odd one, even he had to admit that. It was rare for creatures like him to befriend humans as they attracted humans with sexual want and need from their mere presence alone. Bernie was asexual though which meant none of his abilities could even work on her. He had figured that out quickly upon their first meeting.

Sylvian had just finished up a meal and was walking out of the home when he spotted Bernie taking photos of a brick wall. She had turned in his direction, her eyes widening as she noticed his wings. Instinctively he had shot out a spell of pheromones to make her immediately desire him but, of course, it didn’t work.

“Your wings are so pretty!” she had blurted out as she lifted her camera. “Can I take a picture of them?”

Sylvain was so shocked about his spell not working and her reaction, he nodded without thinking and before he knew it, she had taken a few pictures.

“I’m sorry if that was overstepping my bounds,” she said nervously, fidgeting back and forth in place as she turned the camera so he could see the preview of the pictures. “These are the raws so I have to do some editing but…”

He could only stare at the photos. They were beautiful, there was no other way to put it, the light filtering in through his leather wings putting an halo around his head.

“Can I have a copy once you’re done editing?” he asked.

“Of course,” she said quickly. “And I won’t share it with anyone, it’s just for my personal collection so uh…you know…”

Sylvain had taken off then, casting a spell to turn himself invisible to keep prying eyes off him. He wasn’t expecting her to be there next week but there she was, printed pictures in hand and a friendship had blossomed between them ever since.

And now he was a regular at her house on the weekend. He liked eating human food once in a while, it didn’t sustain him in any way but he liked the taste. Bernie’s food though was something else. Every time he ate as much as he could, making sure to shower her in praise for how well she could cook. She always floundered at the praise, as if she didn’t know how to take it and Sylvian suspected something in the past had scarred her enough that she was unable to comfortably accept it.

“So how was work this past week? Was your boss being a bitch again?” asked Sylvain over dinner.

“She was under a lot of pressure because a deadline was coming up,” protested Bernie. “But we did get the magazine out in time.”

“That’s good, you were really stressing about it last week.” Besides taking photography for her own business, she also worked for a fashion magazine on the side. It was amazing how she managed to juggle both without having a mental breakdown of some kind.

“How about you? How have you been?”

“Same old for me. Found a cool bar downtown with a lot of possible meals so I’ve been hanging out there for now.” He shrugged. Bernie got uncomfortable if he shared too many details about what he did so he didn’t elaborate further.

After dinner was cleared away, leftovers stored in the fridge for the week, popcorn was made and they sat on the couch to watch a movie. Apparently a new suspense thriller had come out and Bernie was too scared to watch it alone. He always found it cute how she would stress-eat popcorn and then slide closer to him, hugging his arm or burying her face into his shoulder whenever something frightening happened on screen.

“Why do you keep watching these if they just make your miserable like this?” asked Sylvain.

“Because…” She squeaked and buried her head into his shoulder as the serial killer stalked the female lead.

Sylvain just chuckled and ruffled her hair. “I’ll let you know if he gets her or not…” He realized his eyes were lingering too long on her bare shoulders and the slope of her collarbones. Her bra was peeking out slightly and for a moment all Sylvain could think about was reaching down her tank top and-

He shook his head, wondering where in the world a thought like that was coming from. His own sexual desire was driven by the women he made enamored with him. Something like that couldn’t happen with Bernie.

“Sylvain? Is he still stalking her?” she squeaked.

“Huh?” He glanced at the TV. “No, she is fighting back with a chair. It’s safe Bernie.”

“Good,” she sighed and turned to look at the TV, her head still resting against his arm.

Sylvain tried to focus on the TV and told himself it was probably a fluke he had a thought like that regarding her. Yes, that was probably all it was.

***

It was definitely not a fluke.

Whenever he visited her, Sylvain noticed it was getting worse. He would notice things about her that set a fire in the pit of his stomach. The way she smiled, the way her thighs looked in shorts, how her breasts were small enough to fit in the palms of his hands, how he wondered what it would be like to kiss her. The familiar comforting scent of her sweet shampoo was now intoxicating for him, it would swirl around him, begging for him to pull her close, to kiss her and love her in a way that only a creature like him could. Incubuses knew how to cater to the desire of a person however it wasn’t like he could do that to her.

No matter how many meals Sylvain had beforehand, whenever he saw Bernie, his hunger would rear its ugly head again, depending that he fill it and it took everything in him to present himself to her that nothing was wrong. How much longer could he do that though?

Not for very long. Now even when he was away from her, his thoughts were consumed about her. He wanted her, he wanted to be with her.

“Look at you Sylvain, you’re falling apart.”

Sylvain looked to the doorway of little apartment hovel he was currently renting. Well, if it could be called renting when he “paid” the landlord with sexual experiences. The meals weren’t that great but it meant Sylvian had a place to sleep. He wasn’t surprised Dorothea could get in, locks were no issue for creatures like them.

“What is happening to me?” he whispered. “I can’t stop thinking about her. Every second, I want to go to her, I want to see her.” He shivered. “I can’t…I eat but it just doesn’t stop.”

“You’ve fallen in love with her.” Dorothea looked at him in pity.

“What? But that’s impossible.” They were creatures of the night, beasts that derived sexual pleasure from the humans. Falling in love was impossible.

Dorothea crossed her arms and looked to the ground. “It isn’t. We can fall in love but this is the result. We become consumed by it, the sexual pleasure we usually look for can only be truly found by having sex with those we love. It’s impossible though.” She gave him a small smile, as if haunted by something long ago. “If we do give in, our bodies will naturally take it all. We will take and take from what has caused us to go mad with want and need until there is nothing left.”

“You mean…” Sylvian looked at her in horror.

“You’re going to kill her Sylvian. Even if you fight it for now, even if you leave this city and never look back, you will want to go back to her, our nature tells us to live for pleasure and pleasure alone and unfortunately we cannot fight our base instincts. No matter what you will seek her out, whether you want to or not.”

Sylvain couldn’t help but sob at the thought. It was already so hard to be with her right now, he couldn’t do that to her. He refused to do that to her. “I can’t,” he whispered. “I can’t let myself do something like that to her.” He looked at Dorothea. “Please. Can you?”

“Are you sure Sylvain? Is she really worth that much to you?”

He smiled as he thought of her gentle smile, how excited she was as she showed him her pictures. How despite knowing what kind of creature he was, she was never afraid of him, never asked for something more than friendship. He loved her and for that he would protect her. “Yes, I’m sure.”

Dorothea nodded and snapped her fingers, her form shifting to a mirror of Bernie. “This will probably help taper the urge long enough for you to say goodbye.”

Sylvain couldn’t even come up with a quip for that as Dorothea raised on her tiptoes and kissed him, her hands roaming down, tugging off his clothes along the way.

***

“Shoot!” Bernadetta grabbed the pan off the stove and shoved it in the sink and ran it under the hot water. She sighed as she watched the steam rise. She had gotten distracted by a game on her phone and ended up not paying attention to how hot the oil got.

She turned off the water and peeked in her living room but Sylvain hadn’t arrived yet. Maybe he wasn’t coming today? He didn’t come by as often anymore and even when he was here, he was only around for an hour at most. She wondered if she did something wrong. Maybe he was getting bored of her. Sylvain was an incubus and maybe spending time with someone like her, who had no interest in sex, was boring.

She broke out of her musings as she heard a thud on her balcony and she couldn’t help but put on a bright smile as Sylvain pushed open the balcony door and stepped into her living room. “I didn’t think you were coming today. I mean, not like I wasn’t expecting you but I thought-”

Without a word, Sylvain walked over to her and put his arms around her in a tight hug.

It wasn’t the first time he had hugged her but there were something different in it. He was holding her too tight, so tight it was like he was afraid she was going to disappear. “Sylvain?” She rested her hands on his back, not really sure what was going on.

“Sorry, give me a moment,” he said softly, his voice different, a little more hoarse than usual. He pulled back but before she could say anything, he had his hands on either side of her head, his thumbs gently stroking her cheeks as he examined her face.

“What’s going on?” she whispered, trying to look for clues for his odd behavior in his face.

“If my magic could work on you I would have used it so you would forget about me,” he whispered.

“What are you talking about?” Fear prodded her stomach. “Sylvain, what are you saying? What’s wrong? Please tell me.”

“I need to go Bernie, you’re never going to see me again but know that I loved you till the end.”

She grabbed onto his hands before he could pull them from her cheeks. “What are you saying Sylvain! It sounds like you are going to…” She didn’t want to say it, she couldn’t say it.

He was so much stronger than her and he easily pulled his hands out of hers and then pulled her hands to his mouth, lightly kissing each knuckle. “Thank you for showing a creature like me what it means to be loved.”

“Stop it, stop talking like that!” She didn’t care if she was yelling so loud her neighbors could hear. 

“Shh, it’s okay Bernie, it’s okay.” He lightly kissed her cheek before pulling away and heading for the balcony window.

“No, no!” She grabbed his arm and tried to pull him back. “Don’t go Sylvain. Please, don’t leave me.”

He looked at her and she could see the tears pooling at the edges of his eyes as he gently pulled her hands off of him. “You’re brave and strong Bernie, you’ll be fine.”

Faster than Bernadetta thought possible, he had slipped out onto the balcony. By the time she got there, he was already a spec in the distance, growing smaller and smaller. She called to him, tears pouring down her face however he never turned around. She collapsed to the ground, her plants around her as she hunched over and cried.

***

“Are you crying?” Dorothea raised an eyebrow as Sylvain landed on the roof next to her. It was a windy night, their hair ruffling in the strong breeze and Sylvain shivered slightly despite him not being able to feel the cold.

He rubbed his eyes and looked down at the tears staining the back of his hand. “I guess I am. Didn’t think it would be so hard.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “She cried. She cried and begged me to stay with her.”

“That’s how humans are, and I guess it is one of the things we love about them.”

Sylvian looked at Dorothea softly. “I’m sorry.”

“Now what do you have to be sorry for?”

“For whoever you fell in love with.”

Dorothea’s expression shifted to surprise for a moment before she schooled it to neutrality. “That was a long time ago,” she said curtly. “Now, shall we get this done?”

Sylvain kneeled on the ground. “Please give _it_ to her. It might be selfish of me but I want her to have it.”

“And if she refuses to accept it?”

“Then toss it in the ocean or something.”

“Alright, I’ll do what I can. I’ll even see if I can make it a necklace to make it easier on her?”

“You always think of all of the little details,” Sylvain said with a chuckle.

“Of course, a girl always has to be prepared.”

They fell silent and Dorothea extended her fingernails into claws. “Last chance Sylvain.”

“I don’t want to hurt her. She’s brave and strong, I’m sure she’ll be fine.”

As Dorothea’s claws dug into his chest, pulling his life force with it, Sylvain remembered Bernie’s face. That bright beacon in the dark.

Maybe in another life they could meet again.

***

“Excuse me, you are Bernadetta?”

Bernadetta steeled herself and turned to the voice. She was showing off her photography at a local art fair, selling small framed versions and taking orders for bigger versions of her art. It was exhausting for an introvert like her but it was good money so she suffered through it.

The person who spoke took Bernadetta aback. The woman was beautiful, her long brown hair in perfectly coiled ringlets down her back, her skin too smooth, too perfect like she was a doll. Or perhaps….

“I can see why he loved your pictures, you do capture an essence in them that I have not seen before in all my years,” said the woman, looking at the photos on display.

“Thank you,” stammered Bernadetta. “Uh, are you looking to buy one?”

“Not exactly, I’m here to give you something.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a small box and held it out to her.

“Uh…” She looked at the box, almost dumbstruck and then at the woman. “I couldn’t…”

“It’s for you from a friend.” The woman grabbed Bernadetta’s wrist and shoved the box in her hand. “I had to add a few details to make it possible for you to wear it but his last wish was for you to have it.”

He?

Bernadetta opened the box and saw a filigree hollow heart pendant on a chain inside. Looking closely, she saw there was a red stone fitted inside the filigree heart. A familiar shade of red. She looked up at the woman wide-eyed. “Is this?”

“He loved you and creatures like us are not allowed to fall in love with humans,” said the beautiful woman softly. “His love would have killed you someday, there was no escaping that fate. He did it to save you, the person he loved. When we die, we leave behind a crystal, what is left of our heart and the fact we even exist. That is the only thing that remains. He wanted you to have it. Do with it what you wish, it always belonged to you.”

Bernadetta clutched the filigree heart so tight it cut into her palm. It had been over a month since he had left through her window after saying goodbye. A part of her hoped that he had just gotten bored of her and then went to another city, somewhere else so he could get away from her. She didn’t want to think of the other possibility.

“Why don’t I watch your stall for a bit until you can compose yourself?” the woman asked kindly.

Bernadetta nodded, unable to form words as she slipped away from the fair and found a quiet corner to herself, the heart still clutched tight in her hands. “Why?” she whispered to the gleaming red stone. “Why couldn’t you just let me be hopeful that you are still alive out there?” Of course the red stone didn’t respond.

After she spilled out all of the tears within her, she stood on shaky feet and put on the pendant, the chain long enough so it rested near her heart. Sylvain had always said she was brave and strong. She had an art fair to finish for the day. Perhaps if that succubus was still there, they could talk a little about him.


End file.
